Tag: atheist

The term agnostic is usually referred to someone who is unsure about the existence of gods/goddesses or something like that. I think that it could easily be applied to being uncertain about any claim to knowledge.

My WordWeb dictionary has two noun definitions of “agnostic”.

1. Someone who is doubtful or noncommittal about something
2. A person who claims that they cannot have true knowledge about the existence of God (but does not deny that God might exist)

I fall under both categories given that I can’t claim 100% certain knowledge about everything that exists or not. Technically I can’t know that I don’t live in a Matrix where everything is all an illusion, but I dismiss this because there is nothing I could do about it if it was true.

I am what I like to call a practical atheist. When it comes to ideas such as the supernatural, spirits, gods, or an afterlife, there is not really anything I can do about these things even if they were true. I have countless reasons for thinking they don’t exist such as the fact that none of them can be clearly defined by the believers in them.

So when a pantheist says God is the universe, then fine, I believe God exists because it has been defined as the universe. However, this is not what a Christian, Jew, or Muslim means when they talk about God. They describe a person with thoughts, emotions, intentions, etc. What I think they are doing is just taking all their own thoughts, emotions, and intentions and combining them all into a blob named “God”.

I used to do the very same thing. I used to think: “I like ketchup so God must like ketchup. I am sad when babies are aborted so God must be the same.”. There came a day when I realized what I was doing. God was nothing more than a clone of my personality. I stopped believing in hell because I didn’t want anyone to burn forever so I figured that God must not be that way either. I was a universalist type of christian for awhile believing that everyone went to heaven after they died.

So what changed? I realized I had not one shred of proof for this. I could not convince anyone that my beliefs were true. Another problem is that I had another internal conflict that was going on. I became increasingly upset at the abortion situation and wondered why God didn’t just turn everyone pro-life, remove their reproductive organs, or just turn everyone asexual.

Of course by this time I already had dismissed the bible as a bunch of lies. I wanted to believe in a nice God instead of the one that demanded animal sacrifices and struck people dead for certain sins. It all sounded so crazy so I quit basing my beliefs on the bible and instead was entirely emotionally driven.

Perhaps I still am a slave to my emotions an what I want to believe, but I have come to understand that is what everyone is doing. What I mean is that we are all biased and have reasons for believing things based on what we believe the consequences are of believing those things.

Think about it this way, people who believe in Free Will do so because they WANT to believe they are in control of their own destiny and what happens to them. At the same time, people who believe in God WANT to believe they have an imaginary friend or heavenly father/mother that will take control over their lives and help them when they screw up.

There is no escape from our desires that compel us to believe or disbelieve certain things. I have come to see believe in God in much the same way as belief in Free Will. It may be a nice thought to believe there is someone to help you when none of the humans in your life care about you, but that does not make it true.

So could I be wrong? Could there be some type of personal guiding force or creator that people have been referring to as “God”? I suppose so, but until I meet this force I will think the concept is just something that mankind started believing to help them overcome their fears about death.

So I am agnostic about this but I use the label of atheist because belief in something is binary. You either live by it or you don’t. I will live this way until I am proven wrong or until I die.

I wasted the first 25 years of my life in christianity and I have come to hate the way it causes people to shut their brain off and just live in a state of perpetual drunkenness. I think of religion as a sort of drug that makes people feel happier but later causes them great pain.

I heard about the National Atheist Party in a podcast and was completely turned off by the whole idea. I want to explain why I am against a political party based on atheism.

The very idea that you can base an organization off of a lack of a belief is completely insane. An atheist does not believe in a God or gods, but that is all. To think that they will all agree on politics is completely insane.

Imagine a party based on not playing basketball, not having hair, not wearing pants, not eating meat, not doing sex, not watching tv, or not driving a car. Think about it and I think you will see the problem.

Atheism is a lack of a thing. There is a reason that I call myself a pro-life atheist. That is because a person must define themselves by what they are instead of what they are not.

There is a radical difference between a pro-life atheist and a pro-life christian, jew, or muslim. I don’t want to get into all the differences in this post but let me say that all matters of morality are seen slightly different when you don’t believe there is a god controlling everything in the world.

I define myself as a pro-life atheist only for the reason that I want people to know that I won’t use threats of hell or use violence against them when talking about abortion. If people would get rid of all the violence and threats often connected with the teachings of religion, it would be different.

But back to the point, any group that defines itself based on a lack of something is doomed to fail. If a member of the National Non-Basketball Association suddenly decided to try basketball, they could be called an apostate and would be told that they will be sent to a hell where they will have to watch football.

Because I want people to remain open to new ideas and to find what is relevant, true, and good, I naturally don’t like exclusive organizations. I am not against people having groups based on a similar interest but when it becomes a political party, it has become a religion like others which spread their lies.

I do not mean to pick on just one political party because I think politics in general is bad. I am naturally going to disagree with any individual or group about something. The point is to let people know why I agree or disagree. Contrary to popular belief, my decisions are not random.

My decision to not be officially part of a religion or political party is heavily based on my Pro-Life philosophy. To be part of ANY group which has the motivation to hurt, kill, or control others is a bad idea to me. I am of the opinion that religion and politics poison everything.

Since atheism is NOT a religion, atheists need to stop acting exactly like those in the religions they often leave. They become hypocrites. I do not wish to be thought of as one of them.

Make no mistake, there is no atheist great commission or power that dictates what a nonbeliever will do. That is the whole point. I use it as a sign that I am a peaceful person. Perhaps as I learn more, a better term will come to mind.

There is no law that I have to be an atheist for the rest of my life and so I remain open to change my worldview if what I am sure of right now is false.

But me being Pro-Life is one think that is nearly impossible to change without killing me or severely brain damaging me.

Atheism, by definition is not something people can gather around as if it is an actual thing. Imagine a National Non-SantaClausist party. That is how silly the idea is to me.

I am a pro-life advocate, but I am not an atheism advocate. The reason is that atheism is a lack of belief, but being pro-life is an actual belief that life is relevant, true, and good. Usually atheists believe that their life on earth is the only one they get. This means that they should think twice before killing anything. The fact that those claiming to be atheists are mostly pro-choice seems impossible to me. Something is wrong.

If atheism was an actual belief system, it could be checked for validity. Instead, I have the challenge of watching individual people who claim to be atheists. Do their words match their actions? Are they truly freethinkers or do they make the mistake of siding with popular opinion?

I understand why some theists might be pro-choice if they have been convinced that murder is God’s will, but for atheists, it is a whole different story. Since atheists don’t have a God telling them what to do, they have the potential to do things that theists can’t do. Some of these things are good and others are bad.

I am disappointed to see that relativism has infected both theists and atheists. The key difference for the atheist is that they don’t have a God to blame their actions on when they do something wrong. This makes them MORE responsible for all their actions. This is something I remember in everything I do.

I think of morality as being something that is based in reality. The Golden Rule is the standard I go by. The reason is because not only is it nice, but also because it is the only thing that makes sense!

If I consider the life of other people to be as relevant as my own, then I don’t kill them. If I kill myself, I don’t live long enough to kill someone else. I don’t understand those who kill other people and then themselves. If they would just start with themselves, then no one’s choice is violated.

Aside from the Golden Rule, there is another rule that I live by. If an action is one that can’t be undone, I should either NOT do it, or I need to have a REALLY GOOD REASON for it. Some things can be reversed and others can’t.

When someone steals something, it is bad, but if they can give it back, then the damage is reversed. If they lie, they will lose trust, but they may be able to tell the truth before more damage is done. In those cases, the damage is reversible. When someone kills someone, they have no way of bringing them back to life. This means that killing is the ULTIMATE irreversible act.

The entire point of being an atheist is that it does not actually define who I am. It only defines what I am not. It strips away all presuppositions so that I can find meaning in my life without needing other sources to tell me what it is.

Not all information is useful and there are motivations for deceiving people. Atheists who hold the pro-choice position on abortion need to stop their hypocrisy. Being pro-choice about things involving life and death means that life does not matter enough to you. If life does not mean anything, then you might as well let the world be run over by those annoying theists who force their God on you.

Avoid the relativism that says that it does not matter what you believe or do. It tells us to be so “tolerant” that we stop asking questions or thinking about things that matter. If this is the only life that we have, then pretending that all truth is relative to an individual means that truth exists only in the minds of the living and then dies. This is why I care about standards that apply equally to life everywhere.

I do not want to let fear control my life anymore. For me, being an atheist means that no God, scientist, philosopher, or king has the right to stop me from telling the truth. They can stop me by killing me, but in the end, they would only be showing their weakness. I find great humor in the way that every time someone comes along and tells people not to kill people, it isn’t long before somebody kills them.

I am convinced that protecting life is the most rational thing that anyone can do. This applies to atheists even more because they can’t expect God to resurrect everyone and make everything right. Many atheists protect their own lives at any cost, but deny the relevance of other people when they see them as a threat. This is mostly based on fear. I want to bridge the gap between theists and atheists.

To help theists understand why I have my own problems with the majority of the atheists, I need to explain that atheists also have “gods” that dictate to them what is right or wrong. Whatever they place their trust in is what they will defend in the same way that theists defend their gods.

If they are trusting in money, then everything becomes about getting money. If this means killing, lying, or stealing, then they WILL do it at the first chance. This can lead to the destruction of many lives. The worst part is that all the work people do at earning money will be completely irrelevant when they die. This is the greatest tragedy of all.

With the knowledge that money does not exist, but life does, it only makes sense to be pro-life rather than pro-money. A pro-money position usually becomes a pro-death position.

As far as whether a creator named God exists, I will let other people fight about that. In daily life, I do not see God, but every day I see the words “In God we trust” . It is written on the paper and metal people refer to as money. There seems to be a relevance between God and money.

When humans choose to murder other humans or other animals. They often say “It is okay to kill because: money.” or “It is okay to kill because: God.”. What then is the difference between God and money? What is it that people put their “trust” in.

The fact that I am not 100 percent sure that God or money exist outside of human brains means that I cannot trust in either. I cannot serve God or money. What then do I serve?

I serve relevance over irrelevance, truth over falsehood, good over bad, life over death.

I trust in what I have seen with my own eyes, heard with my own ears, and touched with my own hands.

By these rules I have chosen, I am convinced that even if I don’t stay an atheist, I will stay pro-life.

The direction of my life changed when I found out that there were many pro-life atheists out there. Looking back, I wonder why I assumed that there were none. Christopher Hitchens was the first I knew about but there are many others. With the power of the internet, I plan to learn all I can about what they are doing.

Finally theists and atheists found something that they can agree on! The reason I choose to write about pro-life atheism is because it is something that people are not as educated about. It was also a revelation to me that belief in supernatural invisible people in no way changes how someone feels about life.

There was a day when I first encountered the website: “http://www.numberofabortions.com/”. Faced with the information of just how bad it was, I could no longer stay silent about it. I would never forgive myself if I did. On that day I decided that there was no possibility of changing this problem by debate, prayer, or protest. People have already done those things for years and yet it has not stopped over one billion babies from being killed. That is not even counting the illegal uncounted abortions. Few people are honest enough with themselves to admit that this is a problem which affects them and that will not go away by ignoring it.

Most of the people in the pro-life movement have been Christians who have damaged their own efforts by teaching that those who do not belief in their God or Jesus in the correct way are going to burn in an eternal fire called hell.

The idea that somehow believing a certain religious doctrine determines an afterlife is offensive to all who had not chance to even hear of it. Think of all those who have died before birth in an abortion or miscarriage. Because of the irrationality of such a claim, I have decided that I place higher value on action than belief. I also can not even think of a way that an afterlife is possible or something that I want. I don’t want myself or anyone else to be tortured after death anymore than I want them tortured in this life.

I have meditated on the meaning of my life and have decided that my life is an awkward stage between conception and death. I do not take it as seriously anymore now that I know I will not get out of it alive.

I desire that theist pro-lifers unite with the atheist pro-lifers instead of fighting about the existence of a God or gods. I got bored with such irrelevant debates. No longer can humanity afford to waste time and money on such things.

My opinion is that pro-life atheists are relevant to me in my personal fight against abortion because they often are more honest and have learned more about science and history than other people allow themselves to.

Becoming an atheist, agnostic, or deist will not change their opinion on abortion. I learned this when I accidentally became a pro-life atheist. If the other pro-life atheists all “come out of the closet”, the world will see a change.

Seth Andrews is an honest man who maintains and creates much content on the internet. His website: “http://www.thethinkingatheist.com/&#8221; has much information about thinking and Atheism. Seth is very relevant because of his focus on thinking and honesty. His podcast is not just about him but about all the people who call into the live show as well as some very special guests. I listen to the podcast and have also read his book: “Deconverted: A Journey from Religion to Reason”. Seth does not give himself enough credit for his work. There are many kind people in any group. I listen to Seth’s podcast because “thinking” is what I find relevant. In the end, I do not care about anything but honesty. I think that the work of Seth is proof that Atheism is nothing to be afraid of. Rather the mental suicide of religion is what Seth and I fight against. I certainly have no problem with saying a person is relevant. Also understand that when I write about the relevance of someone, it is because I learned something that I will remember. I learned to: “Assume nothing. Question everything. And start thinking.”

Atheism is misunderstood by many people. It only means a lack of belief in any type of god or deity. It is a rather confusing term, but it is extremely relevant to understand it. The antonym of atheism is theism. Theism is also misunderstood. It could mean monotheism (belief in one God) or polytheism (belief in many gods). Whether “god” is capitalized depends on whether the word is used as a proper name. I get a little confused about whether I should capitalize it or not.

I do not think that a word such as “god” is well defined enough to know whether I can believe in such a thing yet. I still use the word sometimes when I am trying to explain something else which may be relevant to the existence or action of a god that other people believe in.

What must be understood is that atheism is NOT a belief, but a lack of it. This means that every human is originally an atheist even before birth. As I have said before, people do not agree on what defines a god. Often someone calls themself an atheist just to say that they reject the definition of a god they have heard about. It is a label that has no specific meaning but is often the best word someone can use if they are questioned.

Lacking a belief in one definition of what a god is does not mean that they don’t believe in another different definition. Since everyone has a different personality, there are as many “gods” as there are people.

When I refer to God as “it”, please understand that I am simply not using male pronouns to refer to God, because I feel as though this is placing a limitation on what God can or cannot be. It is not my place to assume God has a penis. People make many assumptions without any reason. They say that God is supernatural, omnipotent, or omniscient. If people knew what these words mean, they would not have used them because these three words often contradict each other.

The word “God” is rather meaningless. People may ask someone if they believe in God, but they assume that the person has the same definition of God that they do. Many people who do believe there is a God have different opinions on exactly what defines it. A definition must be given before someone can even think about it. Atheists can disagree on exactly what it is that they don’t believe in.

As an example, if someone were to define God as the creator of the universe, we would still be left with many questions. How did God create it, or more importantly, why? These are some good questions that people may ask. My own question is: Do I even know what the universe is? Can I believe in something when I am still unsure of what it is? Does God depend on its own creation to believe that it exists? God can exist, whether or not I believe or approve of it. It is not as though belief in something makes it true. A lack of belief doesn’t make it false.

If you don’t believe in God, it is not really the job of any human to try to convince you that it exists because, obviously, they don’t think it can show itself to you if it wanted to. If you do believe in God, then maybe you have a reason for it. No one should try to force you to give up your faith, knowledge, or experiences that led to them. If we were created by God, it obviously gave us brains. What harm can come from asking questions, reading books, or talking to others about what they believe? Why would God be angry at people for trying to learn?

Imagine if Steve were to ask Mary if she believed in Chandler Klebs. Mary would probably ask for a definition. Steve could say “A crazy man who writes about subjects he knows nothing about”. Mary could say, “That doesn’t make any sense! I don’t believe in Chandler Klebs!”. Steve would be giving a correct definition but Mary is also correct in that the definition doesn’t make sense. The trouble comes from the fact that Mary is assuming that people know what they are talking about before they write it down. I wouldn’t blame Mary for saying that the definition makes no sense but Mary assuming that I don’t exist also doesn’t make any sense. I am also unsure whether Steve and Mary exist or whether they believe in me or even talk about me. I doubt it, but I also cannot disprove it. It is entirely irrelevant to me whether they believe that I exist.

You can decide for yourself what your God is and if it is relevant to your life.